How to open a Leica 77
Hi,
Finally, it is quite easy. No special tool is required.
Initial recommendations: Prepare a clean & dust free place on a table and small baskets/plates to place the part you will remove. Make sure that the dismantled pieces will not roll to ground!
Then;
• Remove the eyepiece.
• Open the extensible sun hood
• Take the grey body of the scope in one hand and the black part with the front lend in other hand, and unscrew) the font lens section (opposite clock wise)
• Then the nitrogen escape !
• Take a long screw driver (cruciform) and unscrew the 4 screws.
• (Tip: Scrub the screwdriver end to a powerful magnet in order to magnetize it. This will help you to remove screw when you will pull up the screw driver.
• Then you can spare the body to the prism casing (pull while turning)
• You will now see deeper in the prism casing, 4 screws (Allen shape). You need now use a long allen screw driver. 2 are easy to unscrew. For the 2 others, you need to introduce the Allen screw driver between the rubber focusing belt and the body, and unscrew. Easy !
• You can now pull and split the prism housing part to the back part (where the eyepiece is attached).
• No need to remove the 4 Allen screws if you are afraid to not be able to put them again in their hole. You can just secure them with a rubber ring on the thread side (as shown on photo)
• You do no need to remove back part if you only need to replace the focusing belt.
• to rebuild it, do theses tasks in opposite way until it remains only the front lens, taking care of greasing the front lens thread and ay ring between elements.
• Now you will need to fill it with nitrogen if you have a nitrogen bottle*.
• Introduce a 30cm plastic pipe deeper in the body and start to gently deliver nitrogen opening bottle tap. Nitrogen will push out air. The front lens is approached to the top, like a pan cover, reducing the entrance.
• Pull up & remove the nitrogen pipe little by little up to the top and direct the pipe to the front lens which you place now just above, ready to screw up
• By screwing up the front lens, a little over pressure will occur and will avoid air/water entering (equivalent to 0.2 or 0.3 atmosphere).
Many of the internal part are glued/sticky. This is specially made to catch any free flying dust.
*If you do not have a nitrogen bottle at home, which is not common (you can do it at a tyre repair/replacement shop and You can ask them to refill the scope. It will just cost few Euros/Pounds (Nitrogen is also used for tyres as it is more stable as molecules are bigger than air, and for sure no fogg as there is no oxygen/hydrogen).
Any question, please ask
Yves